Saturday, October 22, 2011

I've come across some excellent articles and ideas I wanted to pass along. It's so frustrating to me that governments and other stakeholders don't understand that investing and strengthening the social infrastructure has so many benefits. There are so many people who are on the tipping point from a socio-economic perspective right now. We need to move fast to stop the increasing numbers of people who are being pulled down by the undertow.

When governments strategically and adequately fund social, health and community services it benefits the recipients of those services directly by improving their quality of life, stability. participation in the labour market and other activities which benefit society.

We can't seem to get past the old school idea of infrastructure jobs as being building roads, bridges and structures. Those are important jobs and definitely contribute to our society but it is time to recognize that jobs in the social, health and community sector are of equal importance for a many reasons. One of those is the intrinsic gains and benefits to recipients, their families and communities. Another is the economic benefits of the jobs in these sectors in local communities and the larger economy of the province.

SASKATOON - A Canadian research institute says babyboomers are retiring as the wealthiest generation in history while couples with young children are stuck in an economic squeeze.

The
Human Early Learning Partnership at the University of British Columbia
released a report Tuesday calling on federal and provincial governments
to spend $22 billion on social programs to fix a declining standard of
living for young families.

It recommends funding a system that
prevents parents from spending more than $10 a day on child care and
allows for 18-month parental leaves from work.

Public policy
professor Paul Kershaw, a self-professed crusader for families, released
the findings in Saskatoon with colleagues from the University of
Saskatchewan. He said he wants the report to be part of the Nov. 7
provincial election debate in Saskatchewan.

Canada
needs a "New Deal for Families" to solve the enormous social and economic
upheaval caused by soaring housing costs, creators of a study released Tuesday
at the University of Saskatchewan say.

The
generation raising children today has less money and time than Baby Boomers,
despite a doubling of the Canadian economy since 1976, said Paul Kershaw, a
family policy expert from the University of British
Columbia.

The
lack of time for children is showing up in a growing number of kindergarten
pupils who are not ready for school. One in three are not ready in areas of
social, emotional, and physical health or language and communications skills,
Muhajarine said.

The
solution is a "New Deal for Families," built on three major public policy
changes, Kershaw argues.

The
New Deal includes:

extending benefits for new parents to 18 months from 12 for all single and dual
earner households, including self-employed and unemployed
parents and should provide a minimum benefit that would eliminate poverty for
families with children under 18 months, he said.

providing $10 per day childcare and finally, promoting flextime to help
employees combine work and family, making them more productive while at
work.

providing incentives for employers to limit work weeks
to 35 hours.

The status quo is costing the Canadian business community $4 billion per
year, according to estimates reached by researchers in collaboration
with British Columbia chartered accountants.

Kershaw believes the plan would control health care expenditures,
control crime, reduce education spending and prepare a labour force that
will be more job-ready when they graduate because they’re more
school-ready at the outset.

In 2010, the Union
of BC Municipalities (UBCM) passed a resolution calling on the province to adopt a
comprehensive poverty reduction plan.

BC has led Canada in child poverty for 8 years in a row and the BC government is holding fast on not creating a poverty reduction plan.

Advocates and service organizations reportthere's been a "dramatic" increase in the number of women and children relying on the Union Gospel Mission for their meals. "The line-up was down the alley and around the block as hundreds more
people than expected turned out for Thanksgiving dinner on Vancouver's
downtown eastside."

As we head into municipal elections in November 2011, we can all do our part by asking candidates and parties what they plan to do to reduce/eliminate homelessness in our communities. There has been enough talk, it's time for action.

TAKE ACTION Look up your MLA using the MLA Finder at http://www.leg.bc.ca/mla/3-1-1.htm
and call, email, or visit their office (report in hand) to tell them
that the cost of poverty is too high. Contact them while they’re in
their home constituencies over the summer and let them know we want to
see a poverty reduction plan in their party’s platform ahead of the
next election.

"We don't have a plan.We have a number of programs, some of them work,
some don't, but if we had a plan we wouldn't see children living in
deep, intergenerational poverty," Turpel-Lafond says, referring to the
call for a provincial poverty reduction plan. B.C. is one of only three
provinces that has resisted implementing a poverty reduction plan.